


No Breakfast

by Kestrel_Sparhawk



Series: Tell Me a Story [2]
Category: The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-12
Updated: 2014-12-12
Packaged: 2018-03-01 04:53:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 698
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2760302
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kestrel_Sparhawk/pseuds/Kestrel_Sparhawk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The morning after Bilbo's disappearance, Frodo has very late spring fever.</p>
            </blockquote>





	No Breakfast

**Author's Note:**

> Comes between "Tell Me a Story" and "Make Me a Song" but can stand alone.

Parties are good things, if you don't drink too much, and if your only family doesn't disappear in the middle. I don't usually drink at all, so a bottle of wine close to bedtime was too much. And Bilbo being gone was way too much.

Gandalf being portentous and obscure was way, _way_ too much.

I don't want breakfast.

I want Sam.

And find him, as I know I will, out back, humming to himself. He has a stack of iris rhizomes (no, I'm not an expert on gardening terminology; he taught me what they were, though he calls them "rizzems" and I had to look up the spelling) and is kneeling in soft dirt, digging in, putting one down, tucking it in, those gentle hands caressing each into its bed.

I wish I were an iris.

He looks up and smiles in welcome. "Bad night?"

"Not good, for certain. My head hurts, my heart hurts."

He has a mug of tea steaming on the ground by him - milky, and, I am pretty sure, sugary. He hands it to me.

I take a gulp. It's still hot, which is a blessing, and yes, sweet. I make a face, but take another gulp.

"You want me to make you some?"

"I can make my own tea, Sam." But I don't move, and keep drinking his. He digs up a clump of iris and begins separating it. When his father divided plants, they looked cowed into submission. When Sam does it, they look relieved.

I kneel in the soil next to him. "Can I do some?"

He looks thoughtfully at my velvet breeches. "You'll get dirty."

"How come when you dig in it, it's soil, and when I dig in it, it's dirt?"

It is an old question. He looks around, and locates his extra trowel. Sam always has two trowels, if not more. He says they're different, but they look very similar to me.

"Make clumps, not rows."

"I know."

We work in silence for awhile. Sam's silence. Valar-blessed silence.

Not being so blessed myself, I break it.

"Do you think he'll come back? "

His sigh answers before his words. "I don't know, Mr. Frodo, but he was awful set on this."

""There's going to be a lot of visitors asking questions later today."

"I'll help."

I know he will. He already is.

My lazy cousins will help too, once they're up. I'm not alone.

I sit back and look at the results of my work. Not that many, so far.

"Aren't these going in the ground a little late?"

He nods. "I was going to separate them next year, but now ... well, we don't know, do we?"

He senses my restlessness. Maybe something else.

"Oh, Sam, you're the best thing in my life."

He smiles, but looks sad at the same time. I can't imagine why.

Soil is thick and loamy on his fingers.. He wipes the trowel on his solid round knee, and the streaks of dirt look like a hand cupping it.

"Come on, Mr. Frodo," he says. "You've drunk all my tea, and we both could use another cup. I'll find you some breakfast, too, before Mr. Gandalf wakes up."

He hauls me to my feet, then tamps down the soil around the newly-planted rhizomes. The soft earth pillows around the golden hairs on his toes and hardens beneath them. Each green spear straightens into its bed, firmly erect.

Sam tilts his watering can and the liquid creams over them, splashing his feet and mine. It finds its path around each iris, soaking it, darkening the soil as it blends with it. One rhizome I put in begins to list to the side, and Sam reaches down and gently raises it upright.

Finally, he wipes his feet on the grass, letting the small clumps of dirt scatter to the soft mat of green. He uses each of his feet to brush down the ankle and the top of the other foot, using his toes to brush out the curls on his golden feet. Then he rubs his thighs with firm hands, wiping them on the grass after.

I don't want breakfast. I want Sam.

 

End


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